


Atonement

by godsdaisiechain (preux)



Series: Atonement [3]
Category: Torchwood
Genre: AU, F/M, Ianto not dead, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-11
Updated: 2016-07-11
Packaged: 2018-07-22 23:28:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,100
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7457854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/preux/pseuds/godsdaisiechain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John Hart wants to make it up to Jack for killing him that time, burying him alive, and things like that.  His efforts are received with mixed reviews.  Continuation of "Love, Actually."</p><p>Ianto, Jack POVs</p><p>For the fan_flashworks "crack" challenge.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Atonement

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Love, actually](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7369882) by [godsdaisiechain (preux)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/preux/pseuds/godsdaisiechain). 



> This is an AU where Ianto doesn't die.

**Ianto**

The room whirled around, so he closed his eyes.   Someone moaned. A gentle hand settled on his shoulder before he understood that the sounds like a dying cow were him. Where was he? Had that thing done something to Jack? The hand stroked his hair, too softly; he knew it wasn’t Jack.

“Gwen? Did they save the kids?”

“Is that you awake, Eye Candy?” John Hart’s voice was recognizable even as it cracked with some unidentifiable emotion. Ianto scrabbled for a gun or a blunt object, his hand closing only on Egyptian cotton sheets. His sheets. John Hart in his bedroom. And he thought things couldn’t possibly be any worse.

Ianto’s eyes opened. The room spun sickeningly around the face of John Hart, and the eyes closed again. “I’ll k…” Ianto gagged, felt John pull him up and hold a bucket under his face while he vomited. After some minutes, ending in a solid minute of dry heaving, Ianto hung, limply doubled over from the side of the bed while John ran to the loo with the bucket. He was back in an instant with water, mints, and damp towels.

“The kids are fine. Rinse your mouth, Eye Candy,” John said, rubbing Ianto’s back. Ianto was too weak to struggle, angry at himself for responding to the soothing tone of voice and soft touch. John held up water and Ianto sipped cautiously. “It’s the virus… and some other things. I had to do something I’d have preferred….” A sort of whimper escaped Ianto’s throat instead of the threats he was trying to issue. John pressed him against his shoulder. For the first time, Ianto saw what Jack may have been attracted to. “But that will keep. You’ll be very ill for a few days until it all sorts itself out. You’re still delicious, though. Don’t worry.”

“Where’s Jack?” Ianto whispered as John tucked him back under the covers and mopped his face with a cool, damp towel.

“Don’t worry that pretty, pretty head. Your Jack will be here soon enough.”

Ianto’s eyes fluttered shut before he had a chance to wonder what John had meant.

 

**Jack**

It took quite a while before he realized the screams were his.   He’d never been blown up before. He didn’t like it.

“Jack?” John’s lips found his forehead. Jack tried to pull away, but John bounced back sheepishly. “You’re not quite finished. I had to make do with scraps.”

That sounded bad, even from John. “Scraps?”

“They got the best bits…most of the head. An arm. I had to make do with a few brain fragments, some fingers, teeth, and a leg. Kind of cracked up, but still…”

Jack’s eyes flew open. “They? Bits?”

“Who knew that we could grow back two of you?” John asked cheerfully. “Of course, who knows what will happen if you’re ever in the same place. I salvaged you a wristband. Not as big as the last one, but big enough.” He rubbed Jack’s naked thigh, then pulled the blanket to cover him again without a single wink or leer.

“What?” Jack tried to sit up, tipped back when John pushed him down against soft pillows. Ianto’s pillows. He was in Ianto’s guest room. Ianto would have a fit. Come to think of it, why was Ianto not responding to the screams and whacking John in the back of the head with a cricket bat? Or better yet, shooting him? Jack looked up to see the quilted material lining the room. “Sound barrier? John, what the f*ck? Where are my pants?”

John took his hand, which was unusual. Jack grew terribly frightened when he realized John trembled with something other than naked desire. There should have been some jokes about sex and a pass by now. This was not like him. “You have to listen, Jack. It’s serious.” Jack’s initial horror gave way to surprise, then sadness, then profound and utter grief, as he heard what had happened—how Ianto had died and Jack had killed his own grandson and fled the planet under John’s protection—and then what John had done.

“I thought you’d get better, but you didn’t, so I went back and I saved him for you. Eye Candy. But he… I didn’t think he would be, well, without you. And you, well…you’re a complete mess. So I went back and forth a bit and got a you together for him. That virus was brutal. I had to graft some Time Lord into him, some of your blood. He’s not quite human any more, not quite like you, but enough. And I got some sort of serum.”

Tears rose in Jack’s eyes. “He’ll never forgive me,” he whispered, not understanding why he felt so guilty for what his other half had decided to do, until he realized that he would have done the same thing. That he never chose to put his family, the people he loved, first. And that that would be the thing Ianto could not forgive. That, and being such a jerk when Ianto was pleased and excited to be thought of a part of a couple. How could he have explained? The last man he’d loved that way, Angelo, had betrayed him so terribly.  Then there had been John, who was crazy, and killed him. Admittedly, there turned out to be extenuating circumstances, but it was still not a pleasant picture.

“Maybe,” said John, unperturbed. He’d done so much worse. Killing Jack, for example, although that had been in the nature of a preemptive mercy killing. “But he might not. And you’ll have a lot of time to figure that out. And he… well he has a certain something, Jack. I see it more clearly now. Besides the looks. You fit together somehow.”

This generosity of spirit was not like John. Jack, still weak from regenerating, was bewildered. “Why? Why did you…” John was crazy, but he’d been Jack’s peer. Jack could tell him things while they were trapped in that loop. John, oddly, had understood, given Jack absolution for his worst sins, risked his life to find and save Grey. Would Ianto have done the same?

“Because I could never forgive myself.” John said. “I told you. I said I’d make it up to you for burying you alive. For not going back and retrieving you sooner. For killing you that time.”

Jack smiled and sat up. “I knew all that rehab was a bad idea. Can I see him?”

“Maybe wait until your ears grow back.”

“Where are my pinkies?” 

“Give it a day or two.”


End file.
